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Australian NBN names first fibre projects
02 March 2010
Mike Quigley of Australia’s open-access company has announced the first five areas where it will build fibre-to-the-home fibre networks
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Australia
NBN
National Broadband Network
fibre-to-the-home
FTTH
Quigley
The company building Australia’s open-access fibre-to-the-home network has announced the first five sites where the network design and construction methods will be tried out.
The NBN Company, headed by former Alcatel-Lucent executive Mike Quigley, is already building a long-haul network in the rural north, and a local network service on the island of Tasmania, but the five FTTH projects will be the first on the mainland.
“The first release sites will provide critical information about the practical application of our designs, construction methods and technology in the real world,” said Quigley. “This will allow us to validate our network design and the total end-to-end systems in a live environment, following full testing in our integration labs.”
The first release sites have been selected to test the impact on the rollout of different terrain, housing type and density, demographics, climate, existing infrastructure and other local factors.
“We have selected sites that represent the diversity of situations we will encounter across Australia in the volume rollout,” said Quigley. “As we have an obligation to build a ubiquitous fibre network available to 90% of premises, we need to understand the challenges of different locations and prepare to use different construction and design methods in every type of geography.”
The first five sites include a suburban area of semi-detached houses, detached houses and apartment blocks; a small rural town with dispersed housing; and three other sites representing a mix of major regional, smaller regional and differing climate and geography.
NBN Co has issued a request for proposals seeking suitably qualified companies to participate in the projects, followed by extensive surveys and site examination works by network planners.
Construction work on the first release rollout is expected to start early in the second half of 2010. GTB